


"oh god, not him."

by glasswren



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Background Relationships, Bad Jokes, Canon Compliant, Enemies to Lovers, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Korean Keith (Voltron), M/M, Mutual Pining, Oblivious Keith (Voltron), Roommates, Roughhousing, Sloppy Makeouts, Slow Burn, The Author Regrets Everything, alot of it, bunk beds, canonverse, james griffin is a disaster bi, keith is tired of james and his shit, kosmo is a good boy, kosmo is lowkey a matchmaker, painfully awkward interactions, super fluffy, the gods of no homo have blessed them, they scare nadia and pidge constantly
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-29
Updated: 2018-10-21
Packaged: 2019-08-05 15:11:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16369991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glasswren/pseuds/glasswren
Summary: Everyone's back at the garrison, trying to sort out the absolute mess of a situation, and attempting to get along. So due to the lack of extra rooms, people have to share. No big deal, right? Well... Excluding the fact that James and Keith have to bunk in the same dorm. They'll just have to sort out their differences. Over a long-- long, period of time.





	"oh god, not him."

_"Please Veronica, for the love of god, not him."_ James pleaded at the brunette as he watched the others disappear down the corridors, presumably to their designated rooms. James hung back however, holding onto the woman's sleeve to prevent her from leaving just yet. She held her clipboard with a curious look printed over her sharp features, head cocked to the side.

James stared her dead in the eyes as he waited for her delayed response, his breath hitching in an almost distraught manner. He couldn't possibly have to room with that guy. He scanned her face desperately for any indicator that she was lying, only to be met with ocean blue eyes tainted with confusion and pursed lips.

"Sorry, man, I don't choose the dorms. What's the deal with Keith anyways? You two seem to know each other." She stated in a flavorful tone, rapping her nails against the polished wood of her clipboard. She held nothing but interest in her eyes, only a slight tint of mischief blurring into her orbs.

_Oh god._

"Uh- okay," James paused sharply, shooting an anxious glance left, then right, before clutching her sleeve just a little bit tighter. "You know that time I got a black eye from tripping into a doorway- right?" He hissed, his jaw only hanging slightly as she motioned for him to continue, arching a manicured brow in question. She now seemed to be considerably intrigued at his quite obvious distress, a faint tug of a dorkish, yet friendly ghost of a smirk tugging on her ruby lips.

"Y-ye-" James stammered unintentionally, gritting his teeth as his mind processed words far faster than his mouth could, squeezing his eyes shut as he straightened his back. It almost hurt to admit that he'd gotten his shit rocked by a kid half his size in seventh grade, still able to recall what had happened far too easy to vividly remember for comfort. His pride refused to let him directly explain that he'd gotten decked for mentioning the emo kid's dead parents; how the hell was he supposed to know that he didn't _have_ parents? James ran through how he could possibly rephrase his speech in a discreet enough way to not tell the McClain that he'd been punted into the floor _(_ _Why did he have so many dramatic phrases for getting punched? Sheesh.),_ yet to have her understand the situation to have his room switched with someone else? He would have been perfectly happy sharing with Ryan!

"Come on James, spit it out." She urged, lacing her finger through her unruly hair as she tapped her foot impatiently. James took a deep breath, biting down on his lip. Whatever his mental draft had put down, he was letting it out now.

 _"I lied, I misjudged him as a momma's boy and didn't know that he didn't have parents at all so I kinda told him to fuck right back off to mommy and daddy so he socked me in the jaw and we haven't talked since-"_ James's sentence slurred into one ongoing breathless excuse, eyebrows furrowed deeply as he awaited a response of any kind. Laughing? Not surprising. Teasing? Not surprising either. Cackling like a witch before riding off on her broomstick into the night? Odd, but wouldn't be out of character for her.

She giggled.

She giggled again, clasping her hands over her mouth tightly in an obvious attempt to silence herself. Her eyes twinkled with suffocated, buried laughter, only pouring gasoline on James's embarrassed flame. His ears burned as he stared her down, squinting as though he was staring the sun down into submission. 

 _"Oh. You're serious."_ She frozen, her hand remaining clamped over his mouth as her eyes doubled sizes. James nodded furiously, unblinking as he gnawed on his bottom lip. James's breath snagged in his throat as she let out a soft sigh, before shaking her head and patting his shoulder reassuringly.

"I'm sorry, but I already told you; I have no control over this. You've gotta talk to Iverson, but I'll see what I can do. You should at least try tonight, maybe he forgot about it." Veronica openly suggested, hugging herself with an arm. 

-

James was not pleased.

He'd retreated to his now "shared" room to find that instead of the individual bed, there was a bunk bed.  _A bunk bed._ It felt like James was eleven all over again-- sharing a room with his little sister and ending up sleeping outside the door because he rolled too much in bed and "kept her up". James could only pray that Keith was a heavy sleeper, because he refused to stay on the bottom bunk. 

So here he laid, on the floor of the room, playing a game he'd made up years ago. He'd ball up a sock, lay on the floor or in bed, and see how close he could get the sock to the ceiling without it actually touching. It was decent for passing time, which turned up to be James's main objective as he waited for lights out. Keith had already set his stuff up, or at least gotten started before disappearing presumably into the shower, with the sound of water in the background filling his ears. The sudden, unreasonably loud fumbling and clatter of something, caught James a bit off guard, the grey sock thumping him in the face the moment he glanced back.

He couldn't help but snicker to himself as it was followed by a deep sigh, and a string of mumbled cursing. So he was human. The thought of Keith slipping up actually left a faint smirk on James's lips, the idea of Mr.Perfect making a mistake rather pleasant to him as he climbed up from his place on the ground. Slightly interested by the photos tossed askew over the raven's bed, he snaked over beside the mattress and began to paw through them.

James took notice quickly that most of them were of him and Shiro, all of them taken from their old Garrison days. It wasn't hard to tell- they'd changed alot over the past few years. It actually kinda bothered James. Keith had gotten taller, alot taller actually. They were the same height now, Keith being maybe an inch taller than him if not. He had that one scar too- the burn mark crawling from his angular jawline, all the way up to his cheek. James wouldn't dare ask from what, like Keith would even tell him in the first place. His hair had grown a bit too, but it had also become noticeably flatter over time. Why had he noticed all this? Because he hated his guts, and you're supposed to keep your enemies close. Obviously.

James couldn't help but notice that rather sudden patter of heavy paws, smiling to himself as he turned away from the bed to see Kosmo slinking over. Even if James didn't like Keith in the slightest, he loved his dog dearly. The wolf reminded him of his own canine, a threatening looking German shepherd that really wanted nothing but to be treated like a lap dog-- which James never really minded, of course. He huffed a short laugh as he tangled his fingers in the wolf's mane-like fur, his eyes warmly narrowed as he bent down further to remain eye level with Kosmo. It was more like a person than he could ever probably understand, more personality in those eyes than some of the officers here had in their entire bodies.

Caught up in his odd interest with Kosmo, James hadn't even noticed Keith,  unfortunately.

James finally took notice of the wet thudding of damp, bare feet against the floor a moment too late, finding himself looking up to see Keith gazing at him in mild concern. 

_Shit._

"Uh-" James stared up uncomfortably at the dark haired man, unwillingly noticing everything. He surely was still thin- but not nearly as scrawny. Fuck. Maybe that's what a couple years in space does to a guy. Yeah. James immediately averted his eyes, standing up stiffly without a word as he removed a hand from Kosmo's head.

"Sorry." He gruffly mumbled, without sparing a glance as he moved away from Keith. He couldn't focus on his painfully attractive appearance if he simply wasn't looking at him. Keith didn't respond, and despite being thankful, James also felt a slightly twinge of irritation warming his flushed face. He watched silently as Keith reached for his clothes, wrapping them around his arm as he gripped his towel a tad bit tighter. 

James stood rather awkwardly to the side as he did so, turning his head sharply whenever Keith caught a glimpse of him staring. He wasn't even reactive, his dimly lit eyes remaining falf lidded as the slipped back to James, holding the same, slightly worried, questioning look. What the fUck did that mean?¿ 

James tensed as Keith walked by him, back to the bathroom to get dressed- or so he guessed. What else would he be doing? James was overthinking. He struggled to resist staring as the man set a hand to the door knob, but simply took a breath instead of disappearing once again.

"Don't worry about it. Kosmo is friendly." 

Then he was gone.

Were those the first words they'd spoken to each other outside of any missions?

**Author's Note:**

> hiya! first multi-chapter fic of mine on here,, oh boy. i hope that wasn't too much of a trainwreck? short but sweet ;)


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